Orange County NC passes their 1/2 cent transit sales tax referendum yesterday. Passage will allow planning to begin on the Chapel Hill to Durham segment of the Triangle area light rail system (Durham County passed their tax referendum last November). In addition some of the Orange County funds will be used to build a new Amtrak station on the Piedmont and Carolinian route in Hillsborough.

Wake County has not yet voted on the 1/2 transit tax necessary to bring the LRT network into Raleigh.

I believe that Triangle area commuter rail (on the NCRR tracks that Amtrak currently operates on) is dependent on Wake County's tax contribution.

The current legislature has made it much more difficult to deliver state funds to rail transit. However, the NC Governor elect, Pat McCrory was an enthusiastic (and effective) supporter of light rail in Charlotte as the mayor, although he had to temper his pro-transit views to gain tea-party support for his gubernatorial election. I suspect the future of rail transit in the Triangle will be largely determined as much by McCrory's fiscal stance towards transit as the Wake county vote.

The director of the Research Triangle Park has announced some details of the struggling park's redesign this morning. While site plans will not be available for a couple of months the announcement made it clear that the project is designed to be heavily integrated with Triangle area commuter rail as well as Wake county LRT (which is currently being stonewalled by the county commission).

While the details are still scarce, this morning's announcement very clearly conditioned the $2 billion in private investment (and a hyperbolic 100,000+ jobs) proposed for RTP on the presence of rail transit to the park. This is probably the most significant corporate endorsement of Triangle area transit possible -- local and statewide politicians, no matter their party, will be unable to ignore this request for rail transit.

But it’s hard to see how the project could continue without the state getting on board. While voters in Orange and Durham counties have approved a one-half cent sales tax to cover the local portion of the project, GoTriangle was supposed to get roughly $138 million from the state for the project over the next 10 years, under the State Transportation Improvement Program. Support from the state will likely play into the federal government's decision on whether to provide funds.

"We remain confident that the funding cap will be addressed in the future, and are grateful for the support we have received for the project," says GoTriangle General Manager Jeff Mann. "We continue to believe the Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit Project provides the best transportation solution for the Durham to Chapel Hill corridor."

But it’s hard to see how the project could continue without the state getting on board. While voters in Orange and Durham counties have approved a one-half cent sales tax to cover the local portion of the project, GoTriangle was supposed to get roughly $138 million from the state for the project over the next 10 years, under the State Transportation Improvement Program. Support from the state will likely play into the federal government's decision on whether to provide funds.

"We remain confident that the funding cap will be addressed in the future, and are grateful for the support we have received for the project," says GoTriangle General Manager Jeff Mann. "We continue to believe the Durham-Orange Light Rail Transit Project provides the best transportation solution for the Durham to Chapel Hill corridor."

Golly, the State's percentage of the capital costs was around 10%. With the Feds providing around 50% or so, the local communities were already providing around 40%. I don't think finding that last 10% of the funding is impossible to overcome. Maybe the Universities, both state and privately supported, can raise it.Don't forget the State is already funding NCRR's Piedmonts and subsidizing Amtrak's Carolina trains, intercity passenger trains already servicing many of these same communities and universities.

DOLRT has been given permission to enter into final engineering by the FTA. While this is good news, they are still struggling to find the 15% of project funding that was originally expected to come from the state but the legislature has since revoked (state contributions to LRT projects are now limited to 10% of total project costs)